Social Things

I posted this as a comment on another MLS-as-savior article, but thought it would be worthy of it’s own home… Thanks for the ideas, but please don’t just regurgitate the MLS spin on football in the US and abroad and their role in it. While MLS may be growing (albeit slowly), the other leagues they […]

This past week brought some interesting reading across the soccer web. First up, a blog post that aligns with our idea of how to tell if your coach is any good. A novel idea, judging your coach not on what they say, but on how their player’s play. Worth a read. Next, Jon Townsend, whom […]

Don Garber, 2010: “we will drive the increased quality and success of the Canadian national team.” Canada Soccer, 2014: “an embarrassingly low 122nd” in the FIFA rankings. I harp on US Soccer and MLS quite a bit, but at least we’re not Canadian Soccer. They are getting screwed by the North American soccer monopoly. Canada […]

Here’s an interesting article discussing (the lack of) training compensation for USA youth clubs. If you’re not familiar, the basic idea is that FIFA requires professional clubs to pay a fee to a young player’s youth club when they sign that player to a professional contract. However, because as usual the US soccer infrastructure is […]

Saw a tweet recently that read: “The worst thing about youth sports? Adults.” My kid played in a recent large soccer tournament near Denver, and in the first game the opposing coach was ejected by the referee for arguing and berating the ref, and in the second game a parent was ejected for yelling at […]

Well, it’s tryout season for youth club soccer and some of us, er I mean some of you, are considering switching clubs. With that in mind I ran across the following advice from a proverbial Soccer Mom: 1. Try to keep an open mind and keep all of your options open. 2. Look at the […]

So I’ve been showing the kid breakdown videos of Barcelona. How to create space with dribbling. How their tactics and movement use that space. Movement off the ball. It’s made little Sam I am excited about soccer like nothing else in a long while. Then Bayern Munich happened. The child couldn’t believe it. How could […]

Tryout season is nearly upon us. As in other years, I’ve heard parents talking on the sideline about switching clubs. I once asked a coach to compare two clubs. He said, “Same shit, different shirt.” I appreciate honesty. So you’re probably not going to see much difference if you switch clubs. They all claim “development” […]